USB 2.0 External Hard Drive

BoOmEr2120 · Post by **BoOmEr2120** » Sat Apr 06, 2002 2:49 pm

Hello,

Today, I purchased an external USB 2.0 hard drive. The hard drive box advertises the maximum speed of the drive at up to 480 megabits/sec. The drive is 7200 RPM. I was wondering just how many megabits this drive actually uses at it's maximum.

The information on the drive can be found here: http://www.buslink.com/Prodinfo/usb2pcall.htm

Brent · Post by **Brent** » Sat Apr 06, 2002 2:50 pm

around 50MB/sec

glc1 · Post by **glc1** » Sat Apr 06, 2002 2:52 pm

480mbps = 60MBps
As with anything, this is a theoretical max. Most ATA 66/100 drives don't reach this, at least not for sustained periods. My guess is you're getting a couple/few MB/sec. sustained, which is remarkable for a 7200 RPM external drive. Firewire (also 480mbps) and USB 2.0 will sure make external drives/devices nice.

BoOmEr2120 · Post by **BoOmEr2120** » Sat Apr 06, 2002 2:52 pm

Originally posted by Brent
around 50MB/sec

Well, I know that the maximum speed of USB 2.0 is 480 Mbps/sec, but will the drive take advantage of the full 480 speed or will it only utilize half or something.

It would be great if the drive did 50 MB/sec, but I don't think that that speed is achieveable, altough I may be wrong.

Brent · Post by **Brent** » Sat Apr 06, 2002 2:53 pm

firewire = 400mbps a tad slower then usb 2.0

Brent · Post by **Brent** » Sat Apr 06, 2002 2:55 pm

Originally posted by BoOmEr2120

Well, I know that the maximum speed of USB 2.0 is 480 Mbps/sec, but will the drive take advantage of the full 480 speed or will it only utilize half or something.

It would be great if the drive did 50 MB/sec, but I don't think that that speed is achieveable, altough I may be wrong.

that speed is a achievable

it's 60MB/sec as glc1 pointed out

you can get 60 megabytes a second on a full usb 2.0 bus

I would suspect the hard drive can definitely burst to that speed or slightly below it, but as for sustained speed that is deteremined by the drive itself

glc1 · Post by **glc1** » Sat Apr 06, 2002 2:56 pm

Originally posted by Brent
firewire = 400mbps a tad slower then usb 2.0

I thought firewire was 480, in fact I know I've seen firewire products, such as cards, advertise 480.

Brent · Post by **Brent** » Sat Apr 06, 2002 3:03 pm

straight from apple, 400mbps

http://developer.apple.com/hardware/FireWire/

it runs at 400mbps today, check out this chart on this page: http://macspeedzone.com/archive/5.0/usbcomparison.html

look at what firewire can scale up to though, http://macspeedzone.com/archive/5.0/de/firewire.html 1600mbps or 200MB/sec, i look forward to those ones for sure

BoOmEr2120 · Post by **BoOmEr2120** » Sat Apr 06, 2002 3:06 pm

Thanks for the great help as always.